As a service to the University, the Office of Information Technology provides Domain Name Service (DNS) hosting. All groups that use University IP space for must follow the Sonnet Network Policy, including the section concerning the registering of all devices attached to the network. (All domain requests should be sent to the Web Policy Committee, if you have questions check the Hostmaster FAQ.)

How Can I use the osu.edu domain?

The osu.edu name space has been opened up to departments on campus, on a case-by-case basis. Due to the limited use of the osu.edu domain, below are the guidelines of how it can be used:

To provide everyone with an equal opportunity to request names and to provide a central reviewing body the Web Policy Committee has been tasked with the reviewing and approval of all names used in the osu.edu name space. All requests need to be submitted by using the online form located on their website.

It is intended for short URL's to web sites however to keep a "clean" and standard length of names all names are limited to name.osu.edu, to aid users that by default type www.name.osu.edu entries a www.name.osu.edu record will be created to direct the user to the name.osu.edu site.

Any requested osu.edu names are maintained as an alias (CNAME record) to a server located in the departments' ohio-state domain, and are required to be directed to a server on the University network.

How can my department receive an ohio-state.edu domain?

If a department is interested in requesting a new domain name in the ohio-state.edu name space they should fill out the Subdomain Request formand include a brief letter that includes the intended use and number of hosts for the new domain.

What other domains will Ohio State host?

For groups around campus that the standard ohio-state and osu.edu domains do not reflect a joint project with external organizations and or Universities they are involved in the Web Policy Committee will review and if approved, provide hosting services for other Top Level Domains (TLD's). These domains should, however reflect in their name an association with the University, where possible.

The one TLD's Ohio State will not provide hosting for is .com. (.Com's are intended to be used by commercial organizations, according to RFC1591.) Since Ohio State is a non-profit, state funded institution .com names do not represent the mission of the University and are not allowed on the network.

Any group that requests a domain must show how the traditional ohio-state domain does not work for their situation, i.e. a joint project that wants to provide equal exposure to all parties involved. The requesting group also must show how the project supports the mission of the University.

For a domain to be approved, using one of the TLD's, the parties involved must include the following:

A letter on departmental letterhead signed by the parental unit chair/dean/director addressing the following:

A description of the purpose/function/nature of the organization that includes the participants involved (including physical locations for both the on and off campus parts of the organization) and the role the University plays in the organization.

If the University already provides hosting for other domains for the people involved how is the new request different.

That it is not a private, business or some other commercial venture.

Agreeing to a periodic review and renewal process of approved domains to insure that the content matches the original signed agreement and that no commercial activity is taking place.

Stating that they understand it is the organization's responsibility to incur any additional costs in the registration process, including but not limited to transferring or renewing the domain name with the appropriate domain registrar.

A second technical letter from the Department Network Administrator is also needed that addresses the following:

Who the billing contact is in the organization.

2. Agreeing to coordinate the creation of the domain with Ohio State, at Network Solutions, with the following conditions:

Ohio State will maintain the domains' primary and secondary name servers.

The "Registrant", "Administrative" and "Billing" contacts will be listed as someone in the organization.

The "Technical" contact information will be the registered NIC handle for the University, ZE146-ORG.

Providing the IP /s that will be used with the new domain.

Agreeing that Ohio State will only support published domain names, and will not provide DNS for other domains that are variations of the published name. IE: Publishing something.org and asking for something.net to point the same place.

Both of these documents should be sent to the following: Ohio State Hostmaster 320 West 8th Ave Columbus, Ohio 43201-2331 614-292-9525 fax

Can areas on campus host their own domains?

Since Ohio State is responsible for the operation of the campus backbone, all domains using University resources are required to reside on the Ohio State name servers.

Any domains found that were created without consulting Ohio State will be reviewed, and if they meet both the requirements for hosting and residing on the University network, it will be added to the Ohio State name servers. If a domain is discovered on the University network does not meet the requirements set forth by Ohio State, it will be removed from University IP space.

This also includes, previously approved domains that did not continue the stated purpose/function/or nature of the domain.

How is Windows Active Directory being used on campus?

Ohio State is currently supports the records required by Microsoft active directory, however due to the security issues that accompany a fully deployed active directory dynamic updates are not allowed to Ohio State's name servers.

The Active Directory configuration page explains DNS options for departments. To use the available features of the directory structure Microsoft requires extra records in DNS. It is important, and somewhat time sensitive, for these records to be passed onto the university Hostmaster, by the Department Network Administrator (DNA) on file, in a timely manner otherwise unexplained/unexpected complications in the directory structure may occur.

For more information concerning the implementations of Active Directory here at OSU we have asked the NT/2000 administrators to use the osu.windows.misc newsgroup to provide their experiences with deployments and to help others thinking of installing Windows.